


A Single Drop in the River of Time

by shouldbeover



Series: Quiet Nights in Wakanda [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Another night before fic, Established Relationship, Feelings, M/M, Pre-Infinity War, Wakanda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-06
Updated: 2018-05-06
Packaged: 2019-05-03 02:13:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14558616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shouldbeover/pseuds/shouldbeover
Summary: Another night before fic. Because Sebastian and the Russos have made it canon that Steve has visited Bucky before, and that hug didn't cover it.





	A Single Drop in the River of Time

Bucky listens to Steve’s heartbeat, steady, strong, even, beneath his ear. It’s slowing down after their exertions. His body aches pleasantly, the echo of Steve still inside him. Steve had taken him, so gently, tenderly, and yet implacably, keeping them both in a slow burn for ages, until urgency had finally overcome him, and he’d lifted Bucky’s hips up until only Bucky’s shoulders remained on the mattress, forcing Bucky into a tight crunch, as Steve thrust into him faster, but still heartbreakingly tender, to their mutual release.

Steve’s phone chimes across the room. The lights brighten slightly and the AI says, “Incoming text from Natasha Romanov.” The lights dim again.

“Leave it,” Bucky says, “Stay. Stay with me.”

He hears Steve’s heartbeat speed up.

“Bucky…”

“I know.”

Steve could stay in bed, have the house read the message aloud, but he doesn’t. Maybe he doesn’t want Bucky to know what it says, to worry him, to protect him.

He gently extracts himself from Bucky’s grip and crosses the room in one easy stride.

Bucky’s house is small, but like all things Wakandan, not nearly as small and primitive as it seems from the outside. The doorway is protected by a forcefield that opens only to himself and Steve. Not even the royal family could enter without Bucky’s permission unless the house deemed Bucky too injured to respond. The surface building is only the top of a wide, spiral staircase that leads down into the cool earth to an open plan room with alcoves delineating kitchen and bedroom. The bathroom is enormous, with a sunken pool fed from a warm, underground mineral spring where Bucky can soak, and a massive shower if he actually wants to get clean.  He and Steve have made ample use of both. A system of mirrors and prisms brings natural light down into the room in a soft, continuous glow, and the AI supplies the rest of the illumination on demand. He is totally connected with the outside world. If he wants to be. He seldom does.

Steve’s brow is furrowed as he types a response to Natasha’s text.

“What is it?”

“Wanda hasn’t checked in the way she’s supposed to. Plus, some strange energy readings and alien sightings. I have to go.”

“Wanda and Vision are possibly the two most powerful beings on earth. They’ll be fine. They’re um, probably too busy, from what you’ve told me. Stay, just a little longer.

Bucky rolls onto his stomach, arches and then bows his back, shameless. He wonders if he could get Steve back for another tumble, maybe two, before Natasha texts again.

Steve chuckles as he crosses the room to start retrieving his clothes. He gives Bucky’s buttocks a slap and takes a moment to appreciate the jiggle.

“You’re getting soft, Bucky.”

Bucky snorts, “Goat farming is strenuous business, Steve.”

Steve tsks, “Whodda thought, Bucky Barnes, Brooklyn boy, finding happiness tending a farm.”

“Don’t knock it ‘til ya try it, bub.” _You_ _could_ hangs unspoken between them. You could stay with me, tend the farm, live our lives as normally as two super soldiers out of time in the most advanced country in the world can.

Steve hears it anyway, “You know I can’t, Buck. No matter how much I want to.”

“You _could_ , but you won’t, I know.”

“I have to. These people…I owe them everything. I love them like family.”

Bucky owes them too, but Steve would never say it. Maybe Steve doesn’t think it, certainly not as much as Bucky does. Maybe Bucky is just projecting as his therapist says he is.

“But you haven’t told them, have you?”

Steve pauses, “There hasn’t really been time. Just that you’re safe, recovering. I can’t betray King T’Challa. If they knew…”

“Knew that they could be safe here, live their lives here in Wakanda? That you’ve been slipping in and out for over a year to visit your more-than-friend Bucky and fuck like rabbits?”

“Yeah. That.”

Steve’s tucked himself into his beaten, bastardized suit, and is checking his pockets for supplies, ammo, necessities. Bucky’s glad to see it. In the early days he was too used to the suit being repaired and returned to him, fully fitted, as it was when he was an Avenger. Now he checks it as thoroughly as the Asset might have, isolated in the field. It makes Bucky relieved and sad at the same time. Bucky wishes that Steve would let Shuri make him a new suit, which she would gladly do. Itches for it, in fact, has prototypes ready, but Steve wears the old suit, even as it degrades, spray-painted black, as penance.

The phone chimes again. This time Steve frowns and bites his lip.

Bucky sits up, stretches, and scratches his ribs, absently. “Whatsa matter?”

“It’s Tony. He’s missing in action.”

There’s a lingering silence.

“He could just be taking a break.”

Tony. The ever-present ghost.

“No, last seen…last seen pursuing an alien space craft over New York. He’s really gone.”

“Steve…”

“It means the world is unprotected, Bucky. Thor’s gone. Bruce is missing. Vision may be. Rhodey’s…wounded. There’s Tony’s protégé, but he’s just a kid who shouldn’t be in it all. There’s just us.”

“You’re going to go back, aren’t you?”

Steve looks at him, blue eyes heavy and sad. “I have to.”

“Do you…do you want me to come?”

“Do you want to?”

“No,” Bucky says, bluntly.

“Then I won’t ask you.”

He doesn’t want it to end badly. They’ve had such glorious luxury. Nearly a week, five whole days of nothing but each other, and Wakandan sunsets and sunrises. It’s too little, it’s more, perhaps, than they deserve.

“If you need me…if it’s too big…you know how to reach me.”

Steve leans over and kisses him, soft, press of lips, kisses his forehead, caresses his cheek. Bucky leans hungrily into the touch.

“Come back to me. It’s all I ask.”

“You know that neither heaven or hell could keep me from you, Buck. Not time itself.”

Bucky doesn’t go up the stairs with Steve. He calls up a screen and watches Steve ride his motorcycle to Wakanda’s border.  Satellites and drones let him follow Steve wherever he goes. When Steve meets up with Natasha, well away from the hidden country he closes the screen.

He takes a deep breath, and calls out for the AI to turn on the shower. The goats need milking, their pens need cleaning. Steve will be alright. It’s another beautiful Wakandan day.


End file.
